Normally by this time on a Friday afternoon, I would already be getting ready to make the long drive across town to see the g-phrase (whose sentimental value to me extends far beyond the dollar value tied to all of her component parts), but this story required a response. This will obviously (and rightly) set off a storm of debate about eminent domain:

Revelli Tire ( search) has been a family-owned business in Oakland, Calif., for 56 years. But if action by the city council remains on course, the tire store will have to find a new home or go the way of the dinosaur.

In July, using the power of eminent domain, the Oakland City Council evicted John Revelli from his store and locked the doors. The council’s argument: One landowner should not impede the progress of a city on the move.

“I am being forced to give up and give away all I have worked for all these years,” Revelli told FOX News.

“It is a compelling story, but it is not correct because we offered far and away more than what the land value was,” said City of Oakland redevelopment director Dan Vanderpriem.

Revelli’s property is located in a block targeted for redevelopment. Not only the tire store but dozens of other parcels have been seized so a private developer can put in condominiums and apartments.

What struck me most--aside from the sense that this was just the sort of unfair and unreasonable maneuver that had to be expected following Kelo--was the assumption from one of the city council members that they had offered far more than the land was actually worth. Quite obviously that wasn’t true: they hadn’t offered more than it was worth to the owner.

What is the value of your belongings? Is it simply a dollar amount covering what it would take to replace the belonging or is it a set of values that might not be tied at all to an actual dollar amount. A while back, when my apartment building caught fire, my worry wasn’t for my computers or my television, but for a simple little bundle of photographs. The sentimental value of the items was far more important to me than the dollar value of the electronics or my hand-me-down furniture.

When my grandpa moved to Arkansas with my parents and they put up the old family farm for sale, I considered selling some of my things and seeing what it would take to buy the land. It was a rundown house and old farm buildings in dire need of work before the city came along and realized the hazard, and it was an old, overgrown yard and mucked up pond surrounded by stone work of dubious value. It was also on the southern side of Colorado Springs while I live on the north side of Denver. For that matter, the neighborhood isn’t precisely posh.

I didn’t want to save the land because it was a good investment or where I really wanted to live; I wanted to save it because most of my good childhood memories are connected to that place. It’s still hard to know that it’s gone.

A family-owned business for fifty-six years, and no one seems to be suggesting that it was a blighted property or otherwise a nuisance. Fifty-six years. Honestly, I can’t even imagine the emotional connection that the owner has to that property.

That he can be forced to sell to make way for condominiums is ridiculous. Making the case that the condos are vital for community interests or that they constitute, in some way, a public need strains credibility to the breaking point. Simple ownership of property has always been somewhat illusory; now the illusion is completely shattered.

Read the story.